T. Barton Carter - Mass Communication Law in a Nutshell

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Mass Communication Law

In a nutshell

Eighth Edition

T. BARTON CARTER

Professor
College of Communication
Boston University

JULIET LUSHBOUGH DEE

Associate Professor of Communication
College of Arts and Science
University of Delaware

HARVEY L. ZUCKMAN

Emeritus Professor of Law
The Catholic University of America
Founding Director
Institute for Communications Law Studies
Washington, D.C.

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Preface

To appreciate the interrelationship of law and mass communication, just check the news feed on your smart phone. Each day one is likely to find news of important court decisions, news of proposed legislation and news about the Presidents executive orders. Even the sports page may contain as much news about lawsuits between team owners, unions and players as about team performance. Starting in the 1960s, there has been a veritable explosion in media coverage of legal issues. The medias increasing influence resulted in more problems for them, especially in the areas of First Amendment protection and Federal Communications Commission regulation. With the emergence of the Internet and other new technologies, the legal questions multiplied, starting with deregulation and re-regulation.

In this book we attempt to meet a continuing need for a basic text in communication law, not only for law students but journalism and communication students as well.

We wish to acknowledge our heavy debt to the following individuals and organizations in the preparation of this text: Professor Thomas I. Emerson, whose many writings greatly influenced our thinking on First Amendment issues, and the editorial board of Law and Contemporary Problems for permitting us to reprint material from Professor Emersons article The Doctrine of Prior Restraint, appearing in a symposium on Obscenity and the Arts in Law and Contemporary Problems (Vol. 20, No. 4, Autumn, 1955), published by Duke University School of Law, Durham, North Carolina, copyright 1955, by Duke University; the late Dean William L. Prosser, founding author of the Handbook of the Law of Torts, whose works greatly shaped our thinking in Chapters II and III on the law of defamation and privacy; Professor Dan B. Dobbs, author of the Handbook of the Law of Remedies (now in its third edition), for his guidance on the law of damages in defamation actions; the late Professor Melville B. Nimmer, without whose brilliant thinking on the law of copyright infringement actions no rational discussion of those subjects could be presented; the editorial board of the Texas Law Review for permission to paraphrase portions of the article by Donna Murasky, Esquire, The Journalists Privilege: Branzburg and Its Aftermath, 52 Texas Law Review 829 (1974) ; the editorial board of the Washington Law Review for permission to paraphrase portions of the article by Professors Don R. Pember and Dwight L. Teeter, Jr., Privacy and the Press Since Time, Inc. v. Hill, 50 Washington Law Review 57 (1974) ; Charles B. Blackmar, distinguished jurist and former teaching colleague and cherished friend of Professor Zuckman, for his insights into First Amendment problems engendered by lawyer advertising (he argued and won In re R.M.J. in the United States Supreme Court). We would also like to thank Research Assistant Kate Davis at Boston University and Senior Strategic Operations Editor Austin Mac Soto, Lead Publication Specialist Laura Holle and Editor Moriah Hamstad at West Academic Publishing for their patience and attention to detail. We are also grateful to West Academic Publishing for its computerized storage and retrieval system that made the progression from galley to page proof to publication so much easier for the authors and helped keep typographical errors to a minimum.

T. Barton Carter
Juliet L. Dee
Harvey Zuckman

November 2019

Outline

B. Background, Theories and Direction of the
First Amendment

Theories and Tests of the First
Amendment

b. Use of a Permanent Injunction to
Restrain Defamatory Speech

(2) General Requirements of the
Privilege

Section 230 of the Communications
Decency Act

The Public Figure-Private Person
Distinction

Specific Problems for the Media Created
by Gertz

Non-Media Defendants and Matters of
Public Concern

B. History and Development of the Common
Law

(3) Celebrity Look-Alikes and
Sound-Alikes

b. Applicability of First Amendment
Theory to Appropriation Cases

c. Federal Cases Involving Hidden
Cameras and Microphones

e. State Statutes on Participant
Recording

i. Applicability of First Amendment
Theory to Intrusion

b. Applicability of First Amendment
Theory to False Light Cases

c. Applicability of First Amendment
Theory to Public Disclosure of Private Facts

(1) Public Disclosure of Private Facts
in Cases Involving Sexual
Assault

(2) Public Disclosure of Private Facts
in Cases Involving Rehabilitated
Ex-Convicts

Common Characteristics of the Four
Types of Invasion of Privacy

D. Legislation Designed to Protect Personal
Privacy

Family Educational Rights and Privacy